Monoclonal antibodies and Fc-fusion proteins have emerged as an important class of therapeutic proteins for the treatment of a number of unmet diseases such as cancer, autoimmune diseases, immunodeficiency, skin disorders and neurological disorders. These products account for 40% of the overall pharmaceutical market with a volume of $35 billion in 2011. However, therapies based on antibodies are very expensive to consumers. Their high price is due in part to the high cost of isolation and purification of these biomolecules. A major contribution to the purification costs results from the ubiquitous use of Protein A or Protein G affinity chromatography capture step. Despite their high selectivity for IgG, these protein ligands suffer from high cost and low chemical and biochemical stability. The average cost of Protein A/G—based chromatographic media ranges between $8,000-15,000 per liter of resin. Protein ligands show in general poor chemical resistance towards the alkaline (0.1-1.0 M NaOH) cleaning-in-place and sanitisation-in-place procedures periodically applied for the removal of contaminants and required by regulatory guidelines. Further, they are prone to proteolytic degradation by enzymes present in the feed. Both chemical and enzymatic agents can cause ligand degradation and leakage of ligand fragments from the resin, resulting in shorter column lifetime and potential presence of toxic and immunogenic leachates in the product mainstream.